[tex-live] [FEATURE REQUEST] support for additional user texmf trees

Vladimir Lomov lomov.vl at gmail.com
Wed Feb 22 15:47:36 CET 2012


Hello,
** Zdenek Wagner [2012-02-22 15:19:55 +0100]:

> 2012/2/22 Vladimir Lomov <lomov.vl at gmail.com>:
>> Hello,
>> some time ago I asked question about how to add support for additional user
>> texmf trees. I found how to accomplish such task. This is what I did:

> I do this without the need of having any patch.

It is interesting.

> The comments in the root texmf.cnf say that this file should contain
> only differences from the texmf/web2c/texmf.cnf.

I suppose you mean $TL/texmf/web2c/texmf.cnf when you say "root texmf.cnf"?

($TL is path where TeX Live was installed, on this host it is /usr/local/opt/texlive).

> This is my place. I copy the definitions of TEXMF and TEXMFDBS.

To where? In which file?

> Afterwards I insert my texmf trees in the order which I like. I have a
> copy of this file in a special subdirectory of texmf-local that is not
> recognized by TeX Live.

Correct me if I'm wrong, when you say "a special subdirectory of
texmf-local" you mean that you own this directory (as user)? Was TeX
Live installed by ordinal user or by root?

If all TeX Live installations were done by ordinal user there won't be a
problem, one can just edit texmf.cnf (not 'root', i.e.
$TL/texmf/web2c/texmf.cnf, simply $TL/texmf.cnf) to accomplish the task.

Of course, I could _every_ time to use sudo to change $TL/texmf.cnf to
add or remove additional texmf trees, but that would be too much.

Imagine, that you want to add additional texmf tree working on computer
on which you don't have rights to change any files outtside $HOME, and
TeX Live was installed by system administator. In such situation I would
be happy to create $HOME/texmf.cnf, slightly adjust TEXMFHOME and go on
to work.

> When a new TL version arrives, I just copy the
> file. The definition relies on symbolic names defined elsewhere in
> texmf.cnf so that TEXMF and TEXMFDBS rarely changes. And as an
> additional sugar, I have it in my private svn repository, I have
> separate directory for each of my computers (I do not install
> everything on all computers) and I have a script that copies
> automatically the correct local texmf.cnf to an active TL directory
> according to hostname.

Something similar here: I use git repo for my $HOME/texmf that I use on
several hosts.

[...]

-- 
"The computer programmer is a creator of universes for which he alone
 is responsible. Universes of virtually unlimited complexity can be
 created in the form of computer programs."
-- Joseph Weizenbaum, _Computer Power and Human Reason_


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